


the need to choose

by deadlybride



Series: fic for fire relief [8]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Established Relationship, M/M, Non-Traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Post-Season/Series 07 Finale, Unplanned Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-22
Updated: 2020-09-22
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:08:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26593432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deadlybride/pseuds/deadlybride
Summary: Castiel tells Dean something he never expected to hear.
Relationships: Dean Winchester/Sam Winchester
Series: fic for fire relief [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1926739
Comments: 23
Kudos: 195





	the need to choose

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ithinktoomuch4438](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ithinktoomuch4438/gifts).



> This fic was written for wildfire relief. Personalized fics are available on request; see [this post on my tumblr](https://zmediaoutlet.tumblr.com/post/629171809812643840/fic-for-fire-relief) for more info.

They hole up after the Leviathan are gone in a hotel, not a motel; a quiet, well-lit room, not a dingy mold-fest; a high-rise downtown instead of a squalid outskirt. Dean sits on the king-sized bed with his knee jogging restlessly, and he keeps putting a hand down to stop it but when his shattered attention comes back his knee's bouncing again. The carpet is a lush navy blue. The bedspread is silky-soft. Sam's been gone for ten minutes. Dean can't concentrate on anything, but he's split between what happened before, and what will happen when Sam gets back.

He keeps looping back. Last night, last week, last month. Six months ago. A year ago. That first time, in that motel when they'd just killed Brady and Sam had had the idea to say yes, to Lucifer, and the horror of that thought had made Dean so—bitter, so horrified, and then that had somehow cracked a wall, that had been keeping them an arm's length from each other. He puts his hand over his face. A wall. Walls keep being their problem.

They'd waited so long. They'd been so careful. Sam had held him, in that bed that they'd wrecked, and he'd kissed the top of Dean's head where Dean was tucked in against Sam's chest, and for a moment despite being the older sibling and despite all the hell that waited for them, Dean had felt—safe. Like a hal should, in a man's arms. It was something he'd never expected to get. There was a lot that he knew he'd never get.

Sam comes back. "Did anyone see you?" Dean says, instead of kissing him in relief.

Sam shakes his head, and then says, unnecessarily, "No. No, I don't think—if anyone's watching us they're being quiet about it. And we've got the hex bags, Dean."

Dean rubs his hands over his thighs, chewing his lip. Sam's stuck, apparently, over there by the door—god, this room is big compared to their usual—but of course that was the point, that this wasn't their usual, that anyone who might know their habits or who might track them wouldn't expect this. Not that Dean knew who might be tracking them, anymore.

They'd gotten rid of Dick Roman, and the Leviathan with him. The plan, just like they'd talked about—to rescue Kevin, the weird little prophet, with Crowley and Meg helping, and Castiel—crazy, stupid, ridiculous Castiel—right there at Dean's side ready to kill Dick, doing right after he'd done so much wrong. He and Dean had stood together, right outside where they knew Dick was waiting, and Castiel had taken the prepared bone out of Dean's hand, and he'd said _let me_ , and Dean had said, _no, dumbass, I'm the one—_ and Cas had touched him, had slid his hand right down Dean's chest to his stomach, and had held his hand flat there, and looked at Dean with eyes that shone. _I'll do it. I don't want either of you to be hurt_.

They'd been alone, in the hall. Dean had frozen, his grip loose around Cas's wrist when he'd meant to yank Cas's hand off his body, and he'd said, _What?_ but of course, he'd heard, even if he couldn't quite—understand it, right then. Cas had smiled at him, very sweetly because Cas without any of his marbles was about the nicest guy Dean knew, and he'd popped out of existence, and Dean had run, had crashed through the door into the plant with Sam and Kevin running up too, and watched Cas stab Dick through the throat with the blessed bone and then the world had—throbbed. Cas had looked at him and smiled and then there'd been an explosion and then Dick was gone, and Cas was gone, and then Crowley showed up and smirked and disappeared with Kevin and then Sam had been gripping Dean's shoulder, holding him back from the strange spatter of black in the lab, and he'd said _did we—did we win?_ Dean had almost touched his stomach but held back, thinking that it couldn't be—that it wasn't possible. Sam had pulled him in, hugged him with his hand tight and soft in the short bob of Dean's hair, and Dean had said, feeling very distant from himself, _Sammy, we need to leave right now_.

They're a state away. The car's kinda wrecked again but Dean can fix it, later. They don't know where Kevin is, where Crowley's taken him, and Meg's in the wind, and Castiel's gone along with Dick. They can figure that out, later. He'd sent Sam to the store, while he checked in alone to this hotel under a simple alias, and he'd texted Sam _room 412, hurry_ , and he doesn't know if Sam had hurried but here's Sam, standing with his back to the hotel room door with a bag in his hand, and his face—Dean looks, finally, at his face, instead of staring at the bag like he has been, and Sam… He's never seen that look, on Sam.

"I got three kinds," Sam says.

Dean licks his lips. "Guess you probably didn't get any booze," he says, and Sam huffs, forehead creasing, and finally Dean feels like he can stand up, even if his legs feel kind of weak, and Sam presses his lips together but crosses the room in a few quick steps and dumps the bag on the bed and then wraps Dean into his arms, his mouth at the top of Dean's ear. A shudder goes through Dean before he can hold Sam right back, his hands gripping inadequately at the back of Sam's jacket.

"We're gonna figure it out, okay," Sam says, quietly. Dean puts his forehead to Sam's shoulder, hiding away in the warm dark that's there. "We'll—we'll talk about it. But let's just—find out, first. Okay? We need to find out for sure."

Logical, sensible. Typical Sam plan. Dean ignores it, for a minute. He wants to just—stand here, leaning his weight where Sam can carry it. Sam drags a gentle thumb over the back of Dean's neck, and waits with him. Patient as a monument. Dean listens to his breath, slowly lifting the chest Dean's leaning against, and counts in his head. A minute. He gets a minute.

Sam really did get three different kinds. Dean lays them out on the nice white bathroom counter, while Sam leans in the doorway. "Jeez, how much piss you think I got in me," Dean says, kinda to himself but kinda not, and Sam's mouth curls up on one side in the mirror, even if it wasn't at all funny. He gets himself a glass of water, drinks it down like a shot, and then unzips his jeans, shimmies them down off his hips and kicks them into the corner of the bathroom. "You going to help?" he says, and it comes out kinda mean even if he didn't really—but jeez, he can't piss by himself?—except that Sam apparently takes it as an actual request, and comes forward, and unboxes the first test himself, and reads the instructions out loud, and shows Dean where to aim. Dean's left disarmed, nervous enough that his hand shakes. Sam looks at him, and braces his hand over the back of Dean's neck, big mitt fitting there warm and dry, and then he kisses the bolt of Dean's jaw just where it meets his ear, and stands behind him, and holds the test steady, right over the toilet. It's left to Dean to pull his panties down, just enough, and pull out his soft clit, and aim, and he thinks for a second he won't be able to do it, his body's clenched so tight, but then he hears Sam sigh very quietly, the breath of it touching Dean's shoulder, and his clit flexes that tiny bit and he produces a stream of pee, wetting the test right where Sam said to. Sam's hand disappears and reappears with the second test, and then he does it again, then there's nothing left but to wait, while the results appear.

Halmen tests are slower than tests for women, according to Sam. According to Sam, it's something to do with halmen's increased testosterone, fouling up the markers. According to Sam, it'll be twenty minutes before they can really be sure. "You're babbling," Dean says, and Sam bites his lips between his teeth and looks away. Somehow Sam's nervousness has calmed his own, at least for a second. Like a seesaw. When one of them's got a solid handle, the other's a wreck, up in the air. Dean washes his hands and then leaves the bathroom, with the tests lined up on the counter, and pulls off the rest of his clothes, and digs for fresh ones in his duffle.

"I'm sorry," Sam says, behind him.

"Not your fault," Dean says, automatically, and then pauses, a clean tunic just dropped over his head and swinging around his hips. "Well, actually—" he says, looking over his shoulder.

Sam really does look sorry. Dean sits on the end of the bed where he'd been waiting before, and Sam comes and sits—not beside him, but on the little loveseat under the window. Night, and the moonlight spilling in over Sam's dark head. Sam drags his hands through his hair, hunched.

"How," Sam says.

Dean snorts. The line arrives in his head— _when a mommy and a daddy_ —but he can't get it past his throat. "You know," he says, instead, and tips so his fingers tuck under his bare thighs. Sam glances at him, then away.

Last month. Or—before. Two months ago. Sam had been insane, had been barely holding up under the weight of all those blackened memories, and then he wasn't insane anymore. Cas healed him—put himself in Sam's place, and gave Sam back to Dean. Bittersweet, but more sweet than bitter, with Sam back at his side, looking at him and being at last, entirely, one hundred percent himself. More himself than he'd been since he fell into that hole at Stull. Dean had waited to get a hundred miles from that awful hospital before he kissed Sam, and felt the relief like a kick in the head when Sam kissed him back, and meant it. They hadn't talked about it really, then. It had been enough to be back together.

He hadn't taken his pills. It hadn't occurred to him, in the chaos of almost losing Sam, in the relief of getting Sam back. His last heat had been when half of Sam was still blocked up behind the wall; the one before that, when Sam didn't have a soul, and it was a shark's unfeeling smile that offered to help Dean through it. He'd taken his pills both times and the heat was a muted, soft thing, just his cheeks flushed and his temperature high and his own wanting, but Sam hadn't come near him, and they'd had better things to do.

With Sam back—a hunt, to get Sam's legs back under him. Another, that went better. They fell into bed together each night gladly, making up for lost time. Sam kissed him sweet, and not sweet, and playful, and rough, and Dean gave back as good as he got, and when one day he woke up flushed with the sheets soaked under him, he didn't even think about it before shoving at Sam's shoulder, getting him awake, and watched Sam's eyes sharpen and his nostrils flare, and that first time, the first raw real time between them, Sam rolled him underneath and took him on his belly, with Dean's hands fisting helplessly into the sheets, and Sam's knot caught inside and tied them tight and it felt so good, so _right_ , that Dean had actually for a few seconds cried, his body lighting up with what it had wanted so long, Sam's mouth at the back of his neck and his big frame covering Dean's, the sweat risen between them and the solid thickness inside just—perfect.

Still. It shouldn't have—done anything. Dean had been in heat, but Sam had said, in their quiet talk after the—well, the fourth time, because they were too busy to talk much before that—he'd said—

"I think it was Cas," Sam says. Dean picks up his head and Sam's sitting forward, his elbows on his knees, his hands laced between them. At Dean's look Sam shakes his head. "Not that—come on. I don't mean it was _Cas_ , I mean…" He draws in a big breath, blows it out noisily. "I've just, I've been thinking about it. Like, racking my brains, here. It's the only thing that makes sense."

What Sam said, in the bed that day, with Dean's head pillowed on his arm and Sam's hand warm and reassuring on Dean's hip: _don't worry, okay? About… I mean, we can't. I know we can't. Before, when the angels told us about how we were a—bloodline, for the vessels. I went to a doctor and I—I thought, if we win somehow, if we don't just die, then there can't be any more. We can't give them another chance. I didn't know what you were going to do but I figured, even if you did someday have a kid, then better to have another vessel for Michael than it would be to have another vessel for Lucifer, so I… Well, like I said. I went to a doctor and got the snip. So. No swimmers to worry about, okay? It's—we'll be fine._

That day, Dean had felt—hard to describe. Unbearably sad, his hormones making it worse; unbearably tender, for the way Sam had been alone, thinking about that, and made that decision alone, too.

Right now, he says, "Cas."

Sam shrugs. "He's healed me, you know? He brought my body back from the cage and it was—perfect, right? Just like when he brought you back, and you didn't have any scars or anything. I didn't either. And I mean, I guess surgery's a scar. If it wasn't then—he healed me when I was soulless, he healed me back at the asylum. It got undone, somehow. It's the only thing that makes—"

He cuts himself off, from repeating himself. Dean chews the inside of his lip, looking at Sam's bent head. "You still feel the same way?" he says. "About—?"

His voice sounds weird. Sam looks up, sits up. Dean closes his eyes, not to see Sam's face.

"I think…" Sam says. He says, then: "Tell me what you think."

"I think you were right." Dean shakes his head, then lies back on the bed, and folds his arms over his eyes so his forearms block out all the light. He talks past them into the room he can't see. "I think it's nuts. I think that if—if we're this long descended bloodline, perfectly bred to be the perfect vessels like that Cupid said, and if we're soulmates like Ash and Joshua said, then whatever kid we might have would be like—the uber super duper mega vessel, something that could hold—anything. Lucifer or Michael, or like. Friggin' God, probably, if he hadn't bailed. I think if you were a crazy angel or a shithead demon, then any kid that could do that would be like the holy grail, right? Or the evil grail. And even if you didn't use the kid as a vessel then you could probably do something else terrible. All those nasty spells the demons know? Sacrifice, and—and whatever, bloodletting and crap—and if you had an ingredient like the ultimate Winchester kid, then who knows what crazy shit you could do. Opening up Purgatory probably wouldn't even be the half of it."

Silence, for a while. "I didn't even consider that," Sam says. "I just kept thinking, if someone got the baby, you'd—we'd do anything. They could make us do anything, just to get the baby back."

Dean drops his arms, lifts up on his elbows. Sam, looking at him, shrugs, his mouth tipping in a not-at-all-happy smile. Dean bites his lip and jerks his head a little, and Sam doesn't respond for a few seconds before he stands up, and comes over, and sits beside Dean, and makes the opportunity for Dean to tug at him, and get him to lay down too. He sighs, when they're close, but he folds his arm around Dean's back and tucks Dean's head under his chin, and Dean grips his shirt and tries to forget hearing the word _baby_ in Sam's voice. It makes too much bubble up in his head that he'd long ago put away, never to think about again.

It's why they're here. Hiding, in this hotel they've had to blow a credit card to afford. If Cas was telling the truth and wasn't just being a total nutbar, then what's in Dean's belly could be a bomb. A nuke. Something that could have all of heaven and hell and whatever's in between looking for them. But—

Sam's hand slides down his back, to his hip. Finds the hem of his tunic and rucks it up, and slides up his bare skin back over the curve of his hip, to his waist, to lay flat over his belly. He's never been a supermodel, his whole life. His chest's flat, but he's always been kind of—soft, and his stomach's no exception, with this little curve there at the bottom that he used to be self-conscious about, when he was younger. As far as he can tell there's no difference to it, now. He'd held his stomach, in the passenger seat while Sam drove them here to this hotel, and he'd thought, he couldn't tell. Seems like he should be able to tell.

Sam's fingers are gentle. He squeezes the softness, there, and when he speaks it's a little muffled, with his mouth pressed to the top of Dean's head. "I keep thinking about it," he says. Like a confession. Dean presses his forehead against Sam's sternum, aching. "About how it'd be."

Dean grips Sam's wrist, between their bodies. He pushes it down, making Sam's hand slide under the bunched-up hem of his tunic, and when Sam's fingers slide over his clit they close around it, immediately, instinct taking over. Dean hitches in a breath and starts opening Sam's belt, quick, even as Sam pushes them both over, Dean on his back and Sam rising up over him, broad and heavy and the only thing Dean wants, right now. His clit's already hard and Sam's fingers slip down between his legs, dip in where he's wet, and Dean drags his heels up, spreading his thighs to make room while he tugs at Sam's jeans, the button fly popping open, his boxer-briefs starting to swell, heat under Dean's hand. Sam fills him with two fingers, kisses him—teeth behind it, no finesse—not now—and Dean gets Sam out of his briefs and squeezes, feeling, pulling—guiding—not that Sam needs it, with how open Dean is, how needing of him. Sam tugs his fingers out and braces that hand on the back of Dean's thigh, the wet fingers dragging hot and slippery there, and Sam kisses Dean again, and again on his cheekbone, and then his breath's hot at Dean's ear as he braces and lets Dean's hands guide him—in—and Dean holds his hips instead, lifts, and Sam splits him wide, driving in, home. Dean grunts; Sam makes a low sound, hand sliding under the back of Dean's neck, into his hair. When Sam finally starts fucking him it's steady, hard, jolting almost, the curled position enough that he's threatening Dean's cervix every time he slams in, but Dean holds him tight and close and takes it, wants more, wants it deeper, wants it never to end.

It ends. Sam comes first, shuddering between Dean's thighs, and he stays inside and with fingers he wets with his own spit he jerks Dean's clit like a little dick and Dean clenches so hard and ripples so deep that Sam makes a pained sound, but Dean wraps his legs around Sam's hips and doesn't let him pull out, wishing that he were in heat so that Sam would knot up inside him, mindlessly greedy, and so Sam applies his mouth to Dean's throat and carefully starts working his clit again, squeezing steadily with his whole hand, his hips crushed in close, and the second time it ripples more slowly, a wave deep in Dean's pelvis, his fingertips numb and hot, his mouth open and gasping into Sam's hair.

Sam kisses him. He lifts up, keeping his hips in place, and cups Dean's face, and then drags his hands down—his throat, his chest. The hem of his tunic, pushed up, and up, until Dean lifts his arms and Sam can drag it entirely off, and then Sam sits up and lays his hands on Dean's belly, and Dean puts his own hands over the top of Sam's, and looks down at that instead of at Sam's face.

"Did you ever think about it?" Sam says.

A million years ago, learning how to mix formula into a bottle. A stint of babysitting, in junior high. Holding Mark's newborn niece, when he'd been living with Mark because Sam was in hell and so he had to attend a baby shower, to be a normal person like Sam had asked him to be, and stroking his knuckle softly against that dumb, fat, silky cheek, and having something inside clench, empty.

Sam's dick slips out, finally. Sam makes a quiet noise in his chest and Dean feels—wet, open. He opens his legs and Sam climbs off of him, and disappears for a second, and Dean stretches out, feels the worked tendons in his thighs, before Sam reappears with a handful of tissues and cleans him up, unromantic but thoughtful. Very Sam. He stripped off his clothes, too, and he's beautiful. Dean thinks it sometimes, in moments like this. His little brother, not at all little anymore. His muscle, and his smooth tan skin, and their shared tattoo, and his eyes as he lays back down, with Dean, with his head propped on his hand—and his hands, broad and long-fingered, and how the one not under his head fits so well on the curve of Dean's hip where it swells up out of his waist, and how much Dean loves that Sam likes to rest it there.

"Are you freaking out?" Sam says.

"Not right this second," Dean says.

Sam smiles at him, and it's very small but it's the first real smile Dean's gotten all day. Somehow that sobers Dean up. He says, "It's been twenty minutes," and watches Sam's face while he acknowledges it. He says, "Sam, we can't have a baby."

"I know," Sam says.

Dean closes his eyes but when he expects grief it doesn't come that way. It's—tangled. Slow and strange, a weird mix—sadness, wistfulness. Anger. Relief. Fingers trace over his temple, tuck his hair behind his ear, and he reaches up and catches Sam's hand, holds Sam's knuckles against his mouth.

"Do you want me to go check?" Sam says, and Dean doesn't at all but he says, "Yes," and lets Sam take his hand away, and waits on the bed, curled on his side, while Sam's weight leaves the bed and his steps are barely heard against the carpet, and the light switches on, and then there's a pause, and then the light switches off again.

A longer pause. Dean opens his eyes and there's the windows, with the night outside, and the moonlight, and the waiting city with its neon and glitter. Sam sits by Dean's hip, puts his hand right back in its place.

"I've been thinking," Sam says, after what might've been an hour.

"That's not news," Dean says.

Sam squeezes his hip. "It couldn't be forever. Heaven and hell—we're too… important, not to sound big-headed about it. We can't disappear forever, because they'd hunt us forever, and they'd find us, because they always do. But we could manage—a year. Maybe."

Dean looks up, frowning. Sam's watching his face, obviously trying to gauge his reaction.

"We have all those sigils, from the cabin," Sam says. "Somewhere else—Oregon, or Colorado. A cabin or a house, that we could take off the map, and no one could find us. No one could know."

Quiet. Dean tries to think through it. "A year," he says. Depending on when they disappeared it'd be—maybe six months, and then another six. Enough time to—god, to fall in love. To break his heart. And then what?

"It's not—enough," Sam says. He abandons Dean's hip and finds his hand, and holds it, in pure defiance of everything Dean's ever said about being a sappy bitch. Their fingers lace together and Dean holds on, tight. "But if you don't want to—" Delicate, like if the word _abortion_ doesn't sully the air then somehow it doesn't count. "If you don't want to. We could—try. We'd have to plan it, just right. We'd have to do it perfectly."

He's being very careful, his eyes on Dean's. Careful or not Dean's brain has already switched gears, thinking ahead. Perfectly, Sam says—fuck that, it'd have to be a miracle. The house, and the hex bags, and when it came to later—when their luck ran out—the decision, they'd have to make. The size of that loss. Even knowing—

"Dean," Sam says.

Dean realizes he's got one hand on his stomach, the other so tight around Sam's that his knuckles hurt. He lets go with the one but not the other. This is—insane. Insane. The idea of it floats as delicate as a blown bubble, glinting barely seen in the air. He sits up and Sam's watching him, waiting. Sam says, "We don't have to decide today."

"I know," Dean says, but he's decided. He feels almost sick but it's—decided. Sick and light-headed, not a good combo. He can't stop touching his stomach. He thinks, in a whole careful sentence inside his head, _this is a crazy idea, baby_ , and like that it's—concrete. It's done.

The grief will come later. For now his chest feels full, like there's champagne under his ribs and it's fizzing to get out. Insane plans are where the Winchesters do their best work, after all.

"We'll have to burn those tests," Dean says, firmly.

Sam looks at him big eyed for a second, and then laughs, a little breathless, a little worried. "We will," he says, and then he laughs again when Dean pushes him back and crawls into his lap, the laugh less worried and more careless, free. Sam's always had a soft spot for insane plans, too. Dean grins at him and Sam cups his cheek, smiles back. "Tomorrow," he promises, and Dean nods, and thinks with giddy fear about the future waiting, after tomorrow.

**Author's Note:**

> [posted here on my tumblr if you'd like to reblog](https://zmediaoutlet.tumblr.com/post/629935352625463296/in-support-of-wildfire-relief-ithinktoomuch4438) \-- reblogs help more people see the relief campaign, so it's appreciated if you have a tumblr.
> 
> Would appreciate any thoughts you have.


End file.
